My parents are in their sixties and they down right “out-party” us. We can’t hang. They constantly teach me and my husband how to do community. Every time we visit, they’re up well past midnight laughing with their friends, or are out late somewhere with them. Last week, my dad was doing yard work, and his friends brought over two boxes of Detroit style pizza (his favorite) for lunch. It’s one of my greatest joys to see my parents, at this age, have such good relationships.
There’s a richness to putting down roots. When I was younger, there was something sexy about being a vagabond or a traveling wanderer. I’ve travelled a lot, and it is fun; you build your own kind of traveling community. But the older I get the more I’m thankful that John and I chose to put down roots. We got married, jumped into the deep end, and didn’t look back.
Community, in recent years, has become such an edgy term— Like, everyone wants to be a part of one. (As they should!) But the type of community I’m talking about isn’t about comfort. The community I'm talking about is one where you live out your life for something bigger than yourself. This kind of community always comes with discomfort. Deitrich Bonhoeffer says, “The person who loves their dream of community will destroy community, but the person who loves those around them will create community.” I have found that community is loving the person in front of you wholly, even when you don't want to. Being a part of this type of community has changed me.
Community rooted us. It told us the truth. It protected us, challenged us, grew us. It showed us what we lacked, and filled in the gaps where there was lack. 15 years in and I’m still learning how to live out this thing called community. I don’t think I’ll ever have the right answers… it’s more of a daily discovery practice.
If I wasn’t so convinced of my call to live life out in community, I’d be on a boat sailing across the world with my family. I’d be traveling, and enjoying the pleasures this world has to offer. Recently, I heard that love is a blended emotion of complete joy and trust. When you find that in a group of people, how can you give it up? I can't. I can say confidently though, that I love my community.
One day, I hope my kids look at me and John and say that their parents did community well. I hope they admire our relationships and acknowledge their own sincere love and need for community. I know there are things we don’t do perfectly, but I pray that one day my kids find themselves in a rich community of people who love unconditionally, and give themselves to something bigger than their own comfort.
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